Why was the Malaysian plane flying over a known trouble spot anyway?

Jim stone reports that other carriers has stopped flying that route right from the start of the troubles there. One such line is Australia's
Qantas.

So why was this plane flying over a known trouble spot anyway? Had not the airline considered the possibility of in inadvertent shoot down?

Surely the Malaysian Airlines would ask what would happen if the transponders went off while flying over the Ukraine considering their recent
occurrence of this event with a plane that went missing only a few months ago.

Can't remember what source I got it from but the no-fly zone extended as high as 32,000 ft and the Malaysian Airlines plane was flying at 33,000 ft.
Still weird though how they just didn't stop flying over altogether, oh to have the magic of hindsight.

I'm also guessing, but I don't think Malaysian Airlines finances were all that great before the disaster, obviously as they "lost" one of the aircraft
previously, cheaper to fly in a straight line than to go around? Possibly.

Airlines always want to fly the shortest path possible to save fuel. Profits are marginal in the business, a few hundred miles can matter!

I will bet you that EVERY airline with a route from Amsterdam to Asia would have flown that way until the downing of flight MH17 - and accentually
several airlines STILL fly that route according to Fligtradar24 (and comfirmed by Finnair via Twitter).

I'd say it probably falls in the realm of planes that flew totally unmolested into the twin towers. It just doesn't add up. You can use excuses like
"They were just cheap on gas" so that the mentally challenged would proxy his automobile fueling practices into an jet full of passengers and
experienced pilots. Doesn't make sense though.

In today's computer flown aircraft could false coordinates been fed to the plane so they flew right into the trouble thinking they were flying around
it? Hell, if I was flying that plane and somebody told me they were going to redirect me right over the top of a war zone I'd be screaming over my
radio like a raped nun. I tend to fly the one finger salute when I feel somebody greasing my cheeks though.

But come on, what remotely intelligent pilot is going to fly his people right over the top of a war zone? A duped pilot I'm thinking.

I don't think that planes get to chose their own flight paths, I'm no expert but I'm pretty sure air traffic control tells them what the flight
path should be.

True that. Plus international equivalent of FAA hadn't declared that air space as off limits yet. I heard about 30 airlines were still using that
airspace for flight paths. It's been declared off limits now.

Basically they didn't care.
The region was approved by Eurocontrol. Who approves flight paths. They were to avoid the more southern zone. This one was well with " the rules" ,
so why would a big corporation care? It's just wrong. I bet there was some doubting Thomas' on board who might have said hey this route isn't safe
and got the eyes roll look.

This airline was already in financial trouble before mh370 , some have speculated they were too cheap to put more fuel in, in order to take a less
risky route.

I see people blaming Russia and Ukrainians getting mad.
But not asking this question simple question, Yes I can understand this is the main flight path, BUT why do they have to risk life's flying over that
area in the first place. when they new the risks from previous planes been shot down in that area.

1. Flight plan MH17’s flight plan was approved by Eurocontrol, who are solely responsible for determining civil aircraft flight paths over
European airspace. Eurocontrol is the air navigation service provider for Europe and is governed under ICAO rules. The route over Ukrainian airspace
where the incident occurred is commonly used for Europe to Asia flights. A flight from a different carrier was on the same route at the time of the
MH17 incident, as were a number of other flights from other carriers in the days and weeks before. Eurocontrol maintains records of all flights across
European airspace, including those across Ukraine. In April, the International Civil Aviation Organization identified an area over the Crimean
peninsula as risky. At no point did MH17 fly into, or request to fly into, this area. At all times, MH17 was in airspace approved by the ICAO.

2. Altitude
MH17 filed a flight plan requesting to fly at 35,000ft throughout Ukrainian airspace. This is close to the ‘optimum’ altitude. However, an
aircraft’s altitude in flight is determined by air traffic control on the ground. Upon entering Ukrainian airspace, MH17 was instructed by Ukrainian
air traffic control to fly at 33,000ft.

The pro-rebel website Russkaya Vesna on Friday quoted Igor Girkin as saying he was told by people at the crash site that "a significant number
of the bodies weren't fresh," adding that he was told they were drained of blood and reeked of decomposition.

...

He claimed that a large amount of blood serum and medications were found in the wreckage.

originally posted by: Apollumi
In today's computer flown aircraft could false coordinates been fed to the plane so they flew right into the trouble thinking they were flying around
it? Hell, if I was flying that plane and somebody told me they were going to redirect me right over the top of a war zone I'd be screaming over my
radio like a raped nun. I tend to fly the one finger salute when I feel somebody greasing my cheeks though.

But come on, what remotely intelligent pilot is going to fly his people right over the top of a war zone? A duped pilot I'm thinking.

You bring up a very good point and one that was bantered back and forth concerning MH370. It's interesting that both planes were Malaysian Airlines
and both are Boeing 777's with leased Rolls Royce engines with the GPS tracking systems. Boeing probably has the redirection codes and this flight
path recoding is in place for hijackings and other criminal eventualities. Could those codes include turning the passenger aircraft alert transponder
off? Could the NSA have passed these codes to the CIA or one of their evil little associate organizations?

Seems a bit odd. If I remember right the passenger plane's transponder notifies AIMS and SAMS that it is a passenger plane and the AIM or SAM
decouples from the target. The only way to get around that is to either mess with the AIM or SAM guidance (manually turn off transponder recognition
or hack it in the AIM/SAM) or turn off the plan's transponder.

The Russian rebels are thugs not hackers, good with a gun and close combat, but they would probably use a screwdriver to program a computer. Probably
the same for the Ukraine military. That leaves the Russians, the US and any other other power that has the motive and ability to get a hold of those
plane recoding codes. We do know the Israeli's do a lot of spying in the US and they have their little Mossad instigators and sleepers all over. It's
also interesting that MH-17 goes down and the Gaza invasion begins.

Could the Russian rebels use the Israeli's as a diversion for the Ukraine situation? Unlikely. Could the Israeli's take advantage of possibly gathered
national security secrets and use the Russian rebels as a distraction? Very possibly.

Right up until the time of the shoot down, several airliners were tracked flying over the region. A number of them belonged to carriers that had
publicly said, weeks ago, that they were no longer flying over the area.

This content community relies on user-generated content from our member contributors. The opinions of our members are not those of site ownership who maintains strict editorial agnosticism and simply provides a collaborative venue for free expression.